Hunger can drive any creature into doing things and going into places it normally never would have dreamed of venturing. It can cause the tiniest scavengers to challenge the largest predator for a scrap of meat or turn on its own kind to fill the void in its stomach. Creatures of the night roam in the daylight to feed the gnawing inside, but when the hunger gets too extreme it can lead one down paths that were once never even considered.

 

Hunger can conquer even the fear of certain death.

 

Into a building’s foundation crack scurries a tiny vermin deep into the pitch black darkness inside. Many of its own kind over the years have passed over this same spot multiple times, their instincts warning them of hidden dangers. Dangers that until today even kept the hunger at bay, but the food is now even scarcer and desperate times calls for desperate measures. No matter how dangerous it can be.

 

Seconds tick into minutes slip into hours. The tiny rat claws its way through a maze of crevices inside the walls finding a meager meal of dead insects and mummified corpses of long dead cousins. The hunger had been fed but still the void called out for more, driving the rat even deeper into the black. Eventually the close quarters of the wall ended and an open expanse lay before the vermin. Its nose twitched as it sniffed the dank stale air of the room it had entered, whiskers flickering wildly. Cautiously it took a step forward, dark eyes darting from left to right before breaking into a full run along the baseboard to escape whatever danger may be hidden in the shadows. A tiny heart beats rapidly with fear, but soon the fear is overcome by curiosity and even more so by the hunger.

 

From one end to another it nails scratch across the cold floor in a desperate search for food, but the room is as empty as the rat’s stomach of a single morsel to feed on. However it is filled with various other things. Things made from substances that it knows will not feed it, but the hunger is growing too strong to ignore any longer. The rat begins to dart from item to item, gnawing at it with its razor sharp teeth. Wood, plastic, glass, rubber until suddenly without warning one of the items it bites, bites back or rather jolts the creature with a bolt of stored electricity. Killing it instantly.

 

The stench of burnt fur and flesh wafts in the still air as the rat shivers and jerks in its final death throws. Then all falls silent, but only for a few moments. A lone red light flickers on a panel mounted unto the wall followed by a low hum of machinery and a bank of computers coming to life for the first time in decades. An overhead light dimly glows before snapping into a brilliant white that illuminates a long glass cylinder that is encrusted with ice crystals within. Numbers scroll across a cracked monitor, ending in three words.

 

Initiating Resurrection Sequence.

 

Seconds tick into minutes slip into hours. Condensation pools at the base of the cylinder reflecting the lights from the surround panels like jewels resting underneath the water’s surface. Just then the hiss of hydraulics raises the cylinder to a vertical position, the sounds of latches popping and the spewing of internal gases are answered by the wail of an alarm from a loudspeaker mounted high into a corner of the room. The cylinder slowly opens sending a gush of water and slush spewing across the floor, as the alarms ceases and the computer lights go out one by one until the room is silent and dark once again.

 

A trembling foot steps out from the cylinder, its toes gingerly touching the wet, cold tiles of the floor. A full uneasy step is taken, but unable to support the weight it bears. A naked body sprawls out in the darkness with a cry of pain and surprise echoing within the room. The figure pushes itself up on all fours and begins to convulse and then retch spewing out whatever had been in its stomach. Lights flicker on once again bathing the room in a brilliance of white revealing the naked female form crawling across the floor. Whether through instinct or knowledge she makes her way towards a pair of stainless steel doors where she depresses a single button. Slowly she carefully stands on her feet and stares blankly at the blurred image of herself though tattooed eyes. She does not recognize the person she sees standing before her, nor can she remember who she is or how she got here. Her fingers reach out and softly trace the outlines of her reflection before the loud ping and opening of the doors startles her and sends her retreating backwards. Still not having her full strength she stumbles and falls back against the cylinder she had just recently exited. She turns around and reads the words scrolling across a cracked monitor screen.

 

Operative Tuck ….MK II ….Activated.  Operative Tuck ….MK II ….Activated.  Operative Tuck ….MK II ….Activated.  Operative Tuck ….MK II ….Activated. 

 

Slowly she backs into the small area behind the open doors and presses another button closing herself away from the only place she knows or remembers being. She takes a deep breath and then leans back as the room shudders then begins its long ascent into the unknown. How she knows what do, how to do it, or when to do it she cannot answer, but she knows she has to get out from where she is and the only way to do that is to go where this ….What is it called?

 

Elevator, yes follow this elevator to wherever it goes. For where it goes is freedom ….but freedom from what? In a few moments she will know the answer to just what.

 

Tuck …is that her name or something else? She doesn’t remember or does she really want to? Her thoughts drift away, but instead of memories she discovers knowledge. She knows things, but no memory of how she learned them. The harder she digs into her thoughts the less she recalls. However she just ….knows. She buries her eyes into her palms and rubs hard in a vain attempt to try and stir something in that mind the lies behind them. Instead she is snapped back into reality by the loud ping that precedes the opening of the elevator’s doors. The soft swish brings in a breeze of fresh warm air that tells her that she has reached her destination.

 

She steps out into a bright sunlit hallway of a building that once could have been a museum at one point, but now stands neglected and abandoned. She glances up into the sunlight that streams in through a shattered stained glass window. The words “Pagan Antiquities” is all that can be made out through the cracks and missing panes. A memory stirs ….or is it a memory? No it is a name.

 

Mys-Tech.

 

What is Mys-Tech?

 

Who is Mys-Tech?

 

The name causes the bitter taste of bile fill her throat, but why? The glass breaks and cracks underneath her naked feet leaving a trail of fresh blood behind each step. She reaches the doors that lead out of the building, hesitates, then burst through them half expecting trouble. What kind of trouble she doesn’t know, but she is ready anyhow.

 

The sun is warm against her skin and temporarily blinds her with it’s bright rays. When they adjust not even the hottest day could remove the chill that grips her tight. Her eyes scan the scene around her. She is in East London, Canary Wharf. Only not the East London she knows, what she sees before her is nothing more than a long dead city. Victim of an apparent nuclear holocaust.

 

Mys-Tech.

 

Did they do this? If they did the bile in her throat has just turned to rage and vengeance and she will make them pay. Who will make them pay? Who is she? She recalls her only true memory. The name she read earlier on the monitor.

 

Tuck. Her name is Tuck.

 

Now she needs to find out just what the hell has happened and make those responsible pay.

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NEXT ISSUE: Warwolves!